During the flight Mary yelled through the intercom: ‘Wizard. This is wizard.’

She had several close calls, including being shot at by British anti-aircraft artillery, which mistook her for the enemy, and being shadowed by a Luftwaffe plane whose pilot declined to shoot when he realised the Spitfire was being flown by a woman.

In Mary’s book, A Spitfire Girl, she said her favourite plane was the iconic fighter, describing it as the symbol of freedom.

Spectacular photos taken from plane cockpit Thu, September 22, 2016

A pilot captured these stunning images of the Northern lights and a thunderstorm from his aeroplane cockpit.

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During the war Mary clocked up 1,100 hours, mostly alone, despite the threat from Hitler’s Luftwaffe

She said: “I must have been four-years-old when I began to wonder why the birds could reach the sky and I couldn’t.

"The day I stepped into a Spitfire was a complete joy and the most natural thing in the world.”